


miss missing you

by Grigori_girl



Category: The Arcana (Visual Novel)
Genre: 5 Times, 5+1 Things, Canon Compliant, F/M, Lots and lots of Pining, Memory Loss, Pining, Possession
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-20
Updated: 2019-12-20
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:15:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21868123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Grigori_girl/pseuds/Grigori_girl
Summary: It was foolish of him to think he could bring her back without consequences.Unfortunately, her memory loss wasn't the worst of them.
Relationships: Apprentice/Asra (The Arcana)
Kudos: 28





	miss missing you

_I miss you._

He thinks but doesn’t say, watching as she smiles at the baker, paying extra for her loaf of pumpkin bread because she knows even someone who cooks for a living has a hard time feeding five kids.

Lianala comes back to him, the bread still hot from the ovens and steaming in the chill of the winter morning, and her smile is near blinding as she shoves it in his hands, tutting at him for not wearing gloves. 

She does it every year, cheeks and nose rosy beneath warm brown skin, her own hands bare to the elements. She used to punctuate her chiding with a kiss, claiming it would warm him, but she doesn’t miss the absence of the gesture like he does. Doesn’t even know there was once a time they would forgo a trip to the markets in favor of staying wrapped in the warmth of each other, their magic and bodies entwined so thoroughly it was hard to tell where one ended and the other began.

_I miss you._

He thinks but doesn’t say, tracing a sigil on the back of her hand with his thumb as she drags him through the markets, her fingers laced with his own. She smiles at him over her shoulder as her feet steady on the ice-slicked streets, his magic soaking into her skin with an ease he envies. The pumpkin bread, still hot from the oven, burns against his chest, tucked inside his coat. Glass bottles clink softly from the bag draped across his torso, and Lianala’s eyes absolutely glitter as she breathes in the scents surrounding the spice stall. The owner never found it in themselves to trust her again, once she came back. Lianala, of course, was none the wiser. She just assumed they were suspicious by nature, but Asra knows the truth. He levels a narrow stare at them as she releases his hand to measure out small pouches of different spices they can’t grow themselves. 

The shopkeep weighs her purchases, tells her the total in a short, clipped tone. They’d inflated the prices. Again. He fights the angry heat that curls around his bones, warded off only by Lianala’s cheerful acquisition and bid for a good solstice. She even wishes their husband, the captain of a local fishing ship, good fortune, says she hopes he returns home soon. She misses the way their cheeks color in shame, or maybe anger, but Asra doesn’t. He smiles as she slips her hand back into his own, the parcel of spices cradled in her other arm. She steers them home, the beginning snowfall landing lightly in the sunset pink of her hair.

“You know,” she says cheekily, “I don’t think they like me very much.” 

He wants to kiss her, her kind defiance something he’d always loved, and his jaw aches with restraint. Instead he simply smiles, gives her hand a little squeeze. “I don’t think they like either of us very much.” 

_I miss you._

He thinks but doesn’t say, nestled amongst the pile of pillows that takes up a corner of the shop, watching as Lianala dutifully puts away their haul. Faust winds up his arm, drapes herself across his shoulders, welcomes him home. It’s too cold outside for her liking, and she’d even waited for his skin to warm before she came close. She can’t read his mind, but she feels the sentiment all the same, her head bumping his cheek in sympathy. 

Lianala hums absently. Asra recognizes the tune, a melody the two of them wrung from an unwilling piano years ago. Bottles clink and dried herbs rustle as she putters about the shop, the unruly pile of ingredients quickly dwindling. Upstairs, the teapot whistles. Asra moves to take if off the stovetop, but she beats him to the stairs. He spares a cursory glance around the shop, expecting to find half their newly purchased wares still scattered about, but everything is put away, the storefront shut down for the night. 

The teapot stops whistling. “Asra? Are you coming?” 

His feet move of their own accord, drawing him up the worn stairs. Lianala floats him a cup of tea, hair pulled back with one of his scarves as she tips back the lid on a pot of boiling stew. Faust slinks down her arm, tongue flickering at the steam rising from the pot. Asra sips his tea, drawing close to get his own whiff of the stew, his hand twitches, muscle memory tempted to take control and place itself on her waist, draw her close.

“Mm,” he hums, heat rising to his cheeks with the warmth of it, “smells good.” 

Lianala grins, knocks her hip against his. “It should, it’s _your_ recipe.” 

He clicks his tongue, “Maybe, but you definitely improved it.” He dips his finger in the pot for good measure, ignoring Lianala’s distressed squawk and her attempt to jerk his hand out of the still-boiling stew. He pops his finger in his mouth, not feeling the burn due to the discreet sigil he’d traced on the top of his foot with his toe. “Mhm, just as I thought. You’ve completely put my original recipe to shame.” 

She snatches his hand, puts the other on his jaw to pry his mouth open. Healing magic soaks into his skin before she even sees what damage there should’ve been. “Are you crazy?” He sticks his tongue out playfully, grinning when she narrows her eyes. She pinches his cheek in retaliation, shaking her head as he laughs. She shoos him toward their little dinner table, standing on her tiptoes to pull down a pair of bowls from the cabinet above the sink. “If only you were half as funny as you think you are.” 

Asra huffs in mock-affront, crossing his arms over his chest, even as she places his meal before him, looking for all the world like she might’ve spit in it for his troubles. He points his spoon at the table between them, “Faust thinks I’m _hilarious_.” Said snake curls in a lazy eight between their bowls, soaking up the heat that pours from the wood. He strokes a finger down her back, bribing her to side with him, for once. “Isn’t that right, Faust?”

She rests her head on the rim of Lianala’s bowl, tongue flickering into the steam. _“Jokes stupid!”_

Lianala crows with victorious laughter, and it isn’t the stew that warms his chest, makes heat rise in his cheeks. 

_I miss you._

He thinks but doesn’t say, watching Lianala as she braids her damp hair, the soft pink turned dark with water, the waves and curls carefully combed out. He forgets, sometimes, how long her hair really is. It had been shorter, three years ago, when she first came back to him. 

He tries not to think about the smell of burnt hair, the ash and bone beneath his broken fingernails. 

He remembers the way the taste of so much death coated his tongue, how he had cradled her charred bones to his chest as he sobbed and sobbed. 

He remembers the _hatred_ that had taken root; hatred for himself, for leaving her; hatred for Lucio, for undoubtedly bringing the plague upon them with his foolish pursuit of power; hatred for Julian, for not fixing her, even if Asra knew it was unfair. 

Hatred...hatred even for Lianala herself. For being too selfless, for refusing to leave Vesuvia to its fate, for not choosing him. A small, dark part of him had hated her, and he’s spent every second since trying to make up for it.

The bed shifts, the wooden pallets beneath creaking with the movement. Asra comes back to himself, flexes his fingers around his book, hears the spine creak with how he had squeezed.

“...ra? Asra, are you okay?” 

He looks up, finds Lianala half crouched over his outstretched legs, brown eyes wide and worried. The whites of her eyes aren’t stained with blood, with plague, and he remembers to breathe. Her fingers brush his knuckles and he forcibly relaxes his grip. 

Asra reaches up, curls her damp hair around his fingers. She’d stopped braiding half-way through, one side finished and the other slowly unraveling. He forces a smile, but the concern doesn’t fade from her face, the taut lines of her body. 

“I’m fine,” he says, gives her hair a teasing tug that makes her swat his hand. “Just...caught up in a memory.” 

Still, she narrows her eyes, grabs the hand that had pulled her hair and laces their fingers. Her other hand skims up his forearm, cradles his elbow. Magic flows into his skin, directionless. It isn’t healing, isn’t inherently calming. It’s just... _her_ , flowing through his nervous system, soaking into his bones. It’s better than a hug, better than sex or the million kisses she used to give him, that he gave her in return. It’s like water to a man dying of thirst, air to someone drowning. 

It's a saving grace, a prayer, a promise.

After a long moment, he releases a shuddering breath, feels the tension leak from his shoulders. Her magic feels like safety, like _home_. Things aren’t like they were, but she’s here, she’s alive, and the smile she gives him is almost enough to make up for it all. 

_I miss you._

He doesn’t think, doesn’t say, because here he doesn’t miss her at all. 

Here, she never left. 

Here, she never forgot. 

Here, she never died. 

She’s safe inside his memory, her head pillowed in his lap, eyes bright with laughter. After all this time, all this heartbreak, he isn’t sure this memory is real, but knows it’s not quite a dream. He hasn’t allowed himself to dream for years, especially not when he sleeps next to her, so close he knows it would be inevitable for their dreamscapes to cross paths. Asra, in his waking hours, worries about what could happen, should he slip. 

If she went catatonic in a state already so unpredictable, he wasn’t sure he could get her back.

In his memory, her smile fades, the grip on his hand loosening. When he speaks her name, it’s muffled, underwater, and he watches in horror as the awareness, the life, leaves her eyes. Her sclera bleeds red; dark, angry veins racing toward her irises like twisted daggers. 

Her skin, usually so warm and live, the sun incarnate, blackens and burns, turns to sickly ash. It rains, fat drops of water falling on her skin, the ash falling away and she slowly disintegrates in his arms. He casts a shield above them, tries to block the downpour, but it keeps coming, he looks up, the sky clear, sunset pink like her hair, but the rain keeps falling on her face _why won’t it stop raining_ —

Asra jerks upright with a strangled gasp, face wet with tears, his hair plastered to his temples. He looses a sigh, hanging his head between his knees. 

It wasn’t a dream, not quite a nightmare. A collection of almost-memories, cobbled together. 

He reaches to his right, searching for Lianala’s reassuring warmth, but finds her missing, the blankets and furs cold. 

Panic grips his heart, squeezes his lungs. “Lianala?” 

“ _Fire!_ ” Faust dangles above their bed, twined amongst the many bolts of fabric decorating the ceiling. He can feel her presence in his mind, scared, pulling him toward the warm glow of the wood stove emanating from the kitchen, separated from the bedroom by a flimsy screen Lianala had saved from the market’s trash. 

Asra scrambles from the bed, blankets tangled around his legs send him careening into the floor, but he doesn’t allow it to slow his momentum. He knocks aside the screen, her name lodged in his throat, and there she is, standing before the stove, hand outstretched toward the flames. 

Inside, the stove salamander desperately tries to bank the fire, the spots on its back glowing with the withheld heat. It presses itself to the back of the stove, trying to avoid her hand, but the fire is too strong, made to last through the cold Vesuvian winter night. 

“Lianala?” Asra dares to ask. She doesn’t move, the flames reflecting in her eyes, fingers a scant few inches from the licking tongues of flame. Asra takes a few cautious steps forward, growing emboldened when she doesn’t react, even when the floorboards creak and squeal beneath his weight. “Lianala, what’s going on?” 

She doesn’t so much as breathe, doesn’t blink, staring into the fire like it calls her name. Tentatively, he wraps his hand around her wrist, tugs her hand away from the fire, turns her to face him, but she looks _through_ him, face blank. 

It’s somehow worse than the times she’d gone catatonic. 

He cradles her jaw, soaks his magic into her skin, just as she had done to him. “Lianala?” 

Something about her... _changes_. Her eyes suddenly seem to focus on his face, pupils blown wide in the semi-darkness, like a predator hunting prey, but the awareness behind her gaze isn’t her own. 

Asra feels his own face harden, his teeth grinding with how his jaw clenches. “Give her back.” 

The smile that splits her lips is too wide, full of too many teeth, made sinister by the flickering light of the fire. “You catch on quick.” The thing wearing her skin purrs, runs a reverent hand up the length of her arm. “But, you forget too quickly: this body doesn’t belong to her.” 

“No?” Asra barks a harsh laugh. “Would you rather it went to Lucio?” 

It shrugs, a fluid roll of Lianala’s shoulders, like adjusting a fine coat. “I don’t care who occupies it, even I find myself fond of the physical form, from time to time.” It picks at Lianala’s nails, plays with the end of a braid. 

One of the major arcana, he’s almost positive, though he can’t be sure which. Not the Devil, nor the Magician or the Hanged Man. Perhaps the Moon or Death, but it’s of little comfort. 

His hands shake, with fear or barely contained rage, he couldn’t say. “Give her back,” it raises her brow, purses her lips, “please.” 

It hums, as if considering it. “Ironic, of the thief to beg the return of his stolen property, don’t you think?” It smooths Lianala’s hands down her body, follows the dips and lines and curves that Asra knows better than his own. “She seemed perfectly happy handing it over, you know. Hardly any fight at all, almost as if she _wanted_ —”

 _“Give her back!”_ He all but roars, snatching the hands that roam over her body. They’re her own, one of them with half-blistered fingertips, but not under her control. It makes his skin crawl, selfishly hopes that she isn’t conscious beneath the arcana’s control. 

The thing wearing her skin, surprisingly, doesn’t kill him outright for his audacity. 

Instead, it cocks her head, studying him. 

Quietly, it says, “You did a cruel thing, magician. Bringing her back.” 

Asra swallows, loosens his grip on her wrists. “She doesn’t remember. She doesn’t know what happened.” 

“Yes, she does.” Asra starts, his heart climbing in his throat. “Her soul remembers, even if her stolen mind does not. Death is a trauma few escape from, and fewer still unscathed.” It flexes her burnt fingers at him, either unaware or uncaring of the pain that must consume them. “The flame calls to her, even if she does not remember why.” The edge of its smile returns, a sharp tug at the corner of her mouth, but it wrests it back down. “Like calls to like. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.” 

“I can protect her.” 

“Can you?” The awareness in her eyes glitter knowingly, and he’s helpless to watch as the bloody red of the plague creeps steadily toward her irises. “You could not with her first life. Why should I trust you with her second?” 

Asra gapes, mouth working as he tries to justify what he’s done, what he’s claimed he can do. “I...I can’t.” He mumbles. “Her life is her own, her choices are her own. I’ll do what I can, for as long as she’ll allow it, but in the end…” He releases her wrists. He’s still plagued with the guilt of leaving, of putting her through all that he has, but something inside him lightens and shifts. He meets its gaze, focusing on the still-brown irises that belong to Lianala, wherever she is. 

“In the end, her life is her own. I can’t promise anything.” 

The thing, _the arcana_ , wearing her skin nods softly. 

“Good. It seems all may not be lost, for either of you, after all.” It places her hand on his chest, over his heart, over the mark. It’s twin flares to life on Lianala’s own chest, bright, even through her shirt. 

Asra stares at her _mark_ , unsure what this could mean.

Why one of the major arcana would deign to... _possess_ Lianala. 

Why it would be satisfied knowing he wouldn’t, would _never,_ try to control her. 

Lianala’s fingers curl and press into his skin. His eyes fly from her chest to her eyes, hoping to find her behind them once more, but the thing’s cold amusement has returned. 

It presses her nails into his skin, as if it wanted to claw his heart from his chest. His hand wraps loosely around her wrist, and he tries to find Lianala underneath the arcana. She could take his heart, if she wished, but he’d be damned if this thing would do it for her, would bloody her hands for its own amusement. 

He presses a palm to her forehead, gentle, even as he feels blood begin to slither down his chest, soak his shirt. “Please, give her back to me.” 

Beneath his hand, the mark upon her forehead flares to life, a twin to the one on their chests, the sister to Nadia’s mark. 

Her lips peel back from her teeth, a mocking smile.

Asra releases her wrist, even as the pressure, the pain, in his chest grows. Instead, he presses his hand to her throat, ignoring its growl. “Give her back.” The mark hidden there, unknown even to her, glows.

The marks, three of a kind, pulse with magic. 

His blood sings, heart straining against his ribcage, as if eager to fall into her palm. 

Somewhere in the city, he knows, Nadia and Julian feel their marks come alive, feels their connection call to them. 

A strained gasp slithers through her teeth, and the pressure over his heart eases. “What’d you do?” The thing hisses, hands fluttering between the marks etched into Lianala’s body, her soul. _“What did you do?”_

Asra lays his palm flat against the mark over her heart, pushes his magic beneath her skin, fuels the mark. “Give. Her. Back.” 

It does. 

Asra watches the red fade from her eyes, the cruel snarl, so out of place on her kind mouth, disappear. That awareness, that _otherness_ , behind her eyes doesn’t leave so easily. 

It seems to pause, as if in approval, before it, too, evaporates.

The air, previously so charged, settles back into a deep winter calm. Lianala’s eyes flutter, her knees buckling. Asra catches her, easy as breathing, pulling her into his arms. 

For a moment, he simply breathes her in, face pressed to her hair, the unruly flyaways tickling his chin. 

His hands shake with residual fear, adrenaline. 

Lianala stirs in his arms. “Asra?” She whispers, voice hoarse from disuse, as if the major arcana hadn’t used her voice at all, just emulated it. “What’s going on?” 

He rubs her back, blinks back the moisture in his eyes. “You were sleepwalking.” She merely hums, leans into his warmth, still half-asleep. “Let’s go back to bed, hm?” Asra leads her back, watches as she crawls dutifully beneath the covers. 

He rights the screen, picks up the blankets and furs he’d pulled off the bed in his mad scrabble to reach her side. The five crescent moons bitten into his skin knit themselves together with half a thought, and he perches himself on Lianala’s half of the bed, healing her fingertips. 

She turns, mumbling something unintelligible, slipping her arms around his waist, burying her face in his stomach. She sighs, content. Asra knows he should pry her off, should return to his side of the bed and feign sleep until the sun rises, but…

He drops a kiss to her head, smooths his hand down her back in soothing motions. 

“I miss you,” he says. 

***

In Lianala’s bag downstairs, Asra’s tarot deck reshuffles itself. 

The Lovers smile, settling on top. 

**Author's Note:**

> My first Arcana fic! Beware, I know nothing about actual tarot/arcana outside skimming the wiki, so feel free to correct me. 
> 
> Send me prompts over on tumblr @grigori-girl!


End file.
